


In Love With Fire

by MACRA



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-09-16 19:39:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16960284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MACRA/pseuds/MACRA
Summary: Petra has devoted her life to the forge. How could she help but fall in love with fire?





	In Love With Fire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fuzziestpuppy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fuzziestpuppy/gifts).



The noise of the commotion reached Petra in her workshop. She listened for long enough to decide that the voices didn’t sound distressed. That meant she could ignore it and get back to work. And if her people didn’t get back to their own tasks, well she could yell at them later when she wasn’t so busy. That was her plan at least. It lasted up to the point when Kaeluf poked his head through the door and said, “Boss, I really think you’re going to want to see this.” She glowered at him, but he just grinned and beckoned her to follow.

He took her to the west gate, where a crowd was gathered looking out to the road. Shaking her head, she pushed her way through to see what they were all looking at. Coming up the path to Free Heap, a strider made its way at a gentle pace, a rider perched on its back. She was able to make out the rider’s long red hair, not that Petra needed it to guess her identity. Aloy was returning to Free Heap.

She tamped down the smile that spread on her face before anyone could see it. She scowled at the crowd and raised her voice so they all could hear. “I’m sure we’re all happy to have a friend return for a visit, but it’s nothing you haven’t seen before. What makes you think this is a holiday all of a sudden?”

Some of the people closest to her shuffled their feet a bit nervously, but no one budged. “Just watch,” someone at the back called.

Petra turned her attention back to the road, frowning. As she watched, she caught sight of a flash of movement in the scrub further on at the side of the road. A scrapper emerged from the underbrush, looked around and bounded in pursuit of the strider and its rider. Petra swore. What were her people thinking of? Aloy might be capable of taking care of herself, but even she was vulnerable to an ambush. If they had known she was being followed and not given any warning…

Before Petra could do anything, the scrapper was upon Aloy. And then it shot past, dashing further up the road without touching Aloy or her mount. It got maybe a dozen lengths ahead, came to a sudden halt that kicked up dust, and then … frisked around in a circle. Petra couldn’t think of any other way to describe its behavior. It turned back to look at Aloy, and she gave it a beckoning gesture. It dashed back and fell in behind her, following the strider a few paces behind.

“OK,” Petra admitted, “that’s new.” She turned to face her people once more. “But now we’ve all seen it, and it’s time to get back to work. Come on, get moving. She’s obviously coming here, you’ll have plenty of time to pepper her with questions later. You all know how she feels about being crowded.” This last point seemed to sway them, and in twos and threes, they filed back into the settlement. Petra shook her head. “I’ve been getting too soft on these jokers,” she said to herself.

She turned back to the road. Aloy still rode at a steady pace. The scrapper still followed after a fashion, although it would get distracted by something at the side of the road and then rush to catch up again. Aloy raised a hand in greeting. Petra waved back and leaned against the gatepost to wait. She supposed her designs could wait until later. Aloy kicked her heels into the strider’s sides and it broke into a trot. The scrapper seemed to take this a signal that it could run ahead, because it once more bounded up the path. It must have noticed Petra, and it made straight for her. She tensed, but Aloy called out to it “Behave!” in a voice that sounded more amused and exasperated than worried. Petra waited, although not without some lingering apprehension.

The scrapper obeyed Aloy’s command. It stopped a few paces from Petra and sat back on its haunches. It might have been a fanciful notion, but to Petra’s eyes, it was waiting for something. “He likes to be scratched on the back of the head,” Aloy called as she approached. Not quite believing what she was doing, Petra reached her hand out cautiously. The scrapper sat still, looking at her. Trying not to think about the size of the grinding wheels decorating its maw, she placed her hand against the crest of its skull and started to scratch.

A deep basso hum emerged from somewhere in the depths of the machine, and a strangely organic shiver coursed through its body. It shifted its weight just slightly forward and up to press against her hand. The smooth metal was neither pleasant nor unpleasant under her nails, but something in the machine’s reaction made her reluctant to stop.

Aloy arrived at the gate and swung off the back of the strider, giving it an absent pat on the neck. She walked up to Petra, thumbs hooked in her belt and an amused grin on her face. “’He?’” Petra asked, pointing at the scrapper with the hand that wasn’t engaged in scratching it.

Aloy shrugged and continued to grin unrepentantly. “He seems like a ‘He’ to me. I can’t really say why. But he’s definitely not an ‘it’ anymore. Are you boy?”

“Well, I suppose I can’t argue with that. I would say ‘Now I’ve seen it all,’ but past experience with you tells me that’s not a safe bet.” She stopped scratching the scrappers head and held out her hand to the Nora girl. “It’s good to see you again, Flame Hair.”

Aloy’s smile broadened as she clasped arms with Petra. “The same to you, Forgewoman.”

As they entered Free Heap, the scrapper quested ahead of them, drawing stares and distracting people from their jobs, but not doing anything dangerous. “Does it - does _he_ have a name?”

Aloy looked sheepish. “Trouble,” she admitted.

Petra laughed. “That’s appropriate. I always said trouble follows you wherever you go, Flame Hair.”

* * *

 

Aloy accepted Petra’s invitation to spend the night in Free Heap. As usual, the Nora girl declined the offer of a room with a bed, instead choosing to sleep under the stars up on the platform where Petra kept her forge. Late after the evening meal, Petra sat with Aloy by the forge, sharing a last cup of wine before Petra retired to the cot she kept in the back of her workshop. Trouble was already stretched out, sleeping or something very like it. Petra had never seen a machine at rest before and wasn’t sure how to think about it.

“You really have no idea why this fellow decided to start following you?” she asked.

Aloy sipped her wine before answering. “None. I’ve overridden dozens of machines. Hell, at this point I’ve probably overridden at least a dozen other scrappers. And if one gets damaged when it’s helping me, I like to repair it. It seems like the right thing to do. There’s nothing different about how I treated him. He should have stayed in his territory like all the others. I tried to send him back at first, but he wouldn’t obey me.”

“Wow, he is smart. Most people take weeks to figure out when to ignore what you’re telling them.”

Aloy stuck her tongue out at Petra before saying, “Whereas people figure out they can ignore you right away.”

“Don’t give yourself airs. You ignore everyone, Flame Hair. You just struck it lucky that it’s the right way to deal with me.”

Trouble twitched one of his rear legs, once, twice, three times. The two women watched him for a moment, but he lay still. “It’s crazy,” Aloy said, “but I wonder if he’s dreaming at times like this. I’ve looked for faults in his limbs, but their perfectly sound.”

“It’s not crazier than anything else about him,” Petra said. “If he can make friends with a person, why can’t he dream as well?”

“You think he sees me as a friend?”

“Who knows what he’s thinking. It’s as good an explanation as any for how he acts around you.” And, she admitted to herself, the thought of there being someone watching Aloy’s back, even if it was just a machine, eased her mind somewhat. “I wonder what a machine would dream about?”

“I’m sure the Nora would say he’s dreaming of the Metal World,” Aloy said, a tinge of bitterness touching her voice.

Petra snorted. “I doubt he’s ever seen any part of the Metal World since he was manufactured. Unless you’ve taken him there.” Aloy’s remark nagged at her, and she looked at the younger woman. She wasn’t looking at Trouble anymore. She was staring into her wine cup with a pensive look on her face. “You didn’t take him to visit the Nora, did you?”

“Not yet. But I have to go there next. There’s things I need.”

“Not looking forward to going home, eh?” Aloy’s relationship with the Nora and the Sacred Lands reminded Petra a lot of her own feelings toward the Oseram Claim.

“Oh, yes. _Home_. The place where if you have to go there, they have to take you in. That’s the Sacred Lands all right.” Aloy winced. “Sorry. I think I’m drunker than I thought.”

Petra reflected that she herself was drunk enough to not let the matter lie, although sober enough to wonder if she was being wise. “Well, if it bothered you enough to mention, you might as well talk it out. I wasn't thinking of home as meaning anything except where you came from. But what was it you called it?”

Aloy sighed. She leaned back and looked at the sky. When she spoke she sounded almost detached. “There’s one of GAIA’s memories of my mother. She was talking about a poem that she loved. The whole things a conversation between two people, a husband and wife. Doesn’t really matter who they are, I guess. Anyway, at one point they have a little disagreement about what home is. And that’s what the husband says about it. He sees as an obligation I guess. The people at home might not like you or love you, but they’re duty-bound not to turn you away.

“And that’s what I’ve got,” she finished. “As long as I’m the All Mother’s anointed one, they have to take me in whenever I have to go there. I doubt even showing up with Trouble can change that.” She raised her cup in toast to the sleeping machine.

“What does the wife call home? In the poem?”

Aloy shrugged and leaned back to look skyward again. “She says it’s a place you don’t have to deserve.”

“Oh.” Petra got to her feet and drained her wine cup. “Well, that’s easy,” she heard herself say. “That’s here. Welcome home.”

Aloy stared at her for a moment, and then with quiet gravity said, “Thank you.”

Petra waved this away. “Don’t mention it. It’s my pleasure.” She licked her lips. “I think I’m a little drunk as well, so I should turn in.”

“Sure,” Aloy said. Was there a hint of amusement in her voice? It was too dark to see her face clearly. To see if that half smile was tugging at her lips.

Petra walked to the edge of the platform and paused at the head of the stairs. She had an urge to invite Aloy to join her. But how would that sound? This is the home you don’t have to deserve; now give me what I want? No, that wouldn’t do. “Good night, Flame Hair,” she said and started down the steps alone.

“Goodnight, Forgewoman,” Aloy called after her. Was there a hint of disappointment in her voice? No, it was just Petra’s own regrets playing tricks on her. She carefully made her way to the workshop and flopped down on her cot. “Idiot woman,” she said to herself, “you’ve gone and fallen in love, haven’t you? What am I going to do with you?” She lay in the dark without an answer. In time sleep claimed her.

* * *

 

The next morning, Aloy got ready to depart early. Petra went down to the gate to see her off. The subject of the previous night’s conversation didn’t come up. 

As Petra watched Aloy pack her gear back onto the strider, Trouble came up and butted his head against her side. He perhaps didn’t understand his own strength and Petra stumbled slightly. However, she reached down obligingly to scratch his head. “You keep her safe out on the road, you hear?”

Aloy mounted her strider and whistled. Trouble trotted over to her eagerly. “Anything you need,” Aloy called down to her, “for me to bring next time I’m passing through?”

Passing through. Ah, well. She wouldn’t be Aloy if she could stay still in one place. “Just a good story from your travels,” Petra answered.

“You got it.” The younger woman gave her a grin, although there was a moment first when something else seemed to cross her face. Surprise? Disappointment? Petra smiled back, dismissing it as her imagination.

“Safe travels,” Petra said with a wave. Aloy clicked her heels against the strider’s flanks, and it started off at a trot. Trouble ran over to butt his head against Petra once more before dashing off after his mistress. And then they were gone, and there was nothing to do but get back to work.

* * *

 

After that, Aloy visited more frequently. The citizens of Free Heap got used to Trouble, and sometimes Petra’s first news of the latest visit was the scrapper wandering into her workshop or up to her forge like he owned the place. Petra did her best to make the Nora woman feel welcome without laying any obligations on her. But sometimes there were slip-ups.

One time Aloy arrived with some stalker components that Petra needed but hadn’t asked for. Careful inquiries revealed that one of her people had mentioned the project to Aloy on her last trip through. After the hunter left, Petra gave her people a talk about not making demands on guests.

Another time, rumors had reached Free Heap of a new bandit troop moving into the area. When Aloy came through, Petra had to inform her. The alternative was letting her go into their territory unawares. She felt guilty when Aloy and Trouble set off immediately to clear out the camp.

Through it all, she became convinced that something was troubling the Nora. She laughed and joked less. Her temper was shorter. Her accounts of her travels grew increasingly terse. At last Petra plucked up the courage to ask if something was the matter. Aloy just gave her a long look, shook her head, and wished Petra good night.

The next morning, Aloy was gone before Petra got up, which meant she must have left while it was still dark out. Petra retreated to her workshop and stared at her designs without seeing them.

“Have you decided I’m made of glass and might break at any moment?” Petra whirled round at the sound of the voice behind her. Aloy stood in the doorway to the workshop, a frown on her face.

“I thought you’d left,” Petra said, once she regained the power of speech.

“You were supposed to. I did leave. Then I came back. Don’t dodge the question.”

Petra shook her head. “I don’t understand the question.”

Aloy scowled at her. “At first I thought it was imagination. Then I thought it was a funny mood, and it would just pass. Then I wondered if you were angry about something, but I can’t believe you’d be able to keep it to yourself this long. But something’s up between us. I see you with your people, and you’re the same old Petra. Rude, crude, sarcastic. Bossy as hell. But for me, you’ve just got this lukewarm nothing. I get these polite questions about how my travels are and that’s it. You won’t even tell me that you need parts anymore, even though I’m the most qualified person you know to hunt them down. Even now, when your main project is at a standstill.”

“How did you - Who told you?”

Aloy threw her hands up. “No one told me! They’re probably all too scared of you. I had to sneak into your town like it was a bandit camp and eavesdrop. The only thing I can think is that for some reason you don’t trust me anymore. What the hell is going on?”

Petra folded her arms and looked away. “I just didn’t want to put demands on you,” she said quietly.

Aloy stared at her for a long moment. “Well, I can make that easy for you,” she said and turned to go.

“Wait!” Petra caught the young woman by the arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disrespect you. I thought… I thought I was giving you what you wanted. A place you didn’t have to deserve.”

Aloy stared at her, confusion slowly being replaced with recognition. She buried her face in her hands and started to laugh. “It’s no wonder I feel like I fit in here. You’re as bad at understanding people as I am. Just because I don’t have to deserve it doesn’t mean I don’t want to deserve it. I mean, how would you feel about this place if your people came to you and said, ‘OK. Put your feet up. We’ll take care of all the mad inventing from now on.’”

“…oh.”

Aloy nodded. “Yeah. ‘Oh.’ I liked it when I was contributing to this place. I like being asked to test out guns that are more than half my size. I like taking the weird requests for the latest obscure part you need. I like protecting a bunch of crazy misfit tinkers who for their own safety and sanity should never have been allowed to start their own town, yet here we all are anyway.” She shrugged. “I doubt I’d have come back even once if I didn’t like it all.”

Petra snorted. “What? Even the inappropriate flirting?”

Aloy raised an eyebrow. “Are you offering to start that up again? Because it would start to make things seem more normal around here.”

Petra felt a lump in her throat and swallowed. “I don’t know if I can.” She closed her eyes. “It was a lot easier when I didn’t care if you took it seriously.”

The silence stretched on until she opened her eyes to peer at Aloy. The younger woman was looking at her with a strange half smile on her face. “I see. So what you’re saying is that you’d like to replace it with _appropriate_ flirting.”

“I - What?”

Aloy stepped closer to her. In confusion, Petra stepped back. Aloy’s smile grew broader. “Don’t tell me the forgewoman is afraid of a little fire.”

Another step forward for Aloy. Another step back for Petra. She felt her work table behind her. She gripped it behind her back, drawing reassurance from its solidity. She couldn’t quite believe what was happening, but she might as well see where it led her. “I’ve been taming fire since before I was your age,” she said and lifted her chin defiantly.

Aloy leaned against the table, very close to her. “So you think you can tame me?” Aloy’s smile became a grin.

“Maybe.” Petra grinned back. “But maybe I don’t want to. Maybe I like seeing you run wild.”

“Now that sounds like the Petra I know.” The Nora woman leaned in close to press her lips against Petra’s in a light fleeting kiss. “It’s good to have you back. It wouldn’t be a home here without the real you.”

“Well, we can’t have that,” Petra murmured and reached up to cup Aloy’s chin in her hand, pulling her back into another, longer kiss. As the kiss continued, Aloy’s hands reached up, pushing the leather cap from Petra’s head, the fingers running through her hair.

Before she was lost completely, a familiar sound penetrated her consciousness through the growing fog of joy and desire. Metal paws tap-tapped on stone flagging. Aloy broke the kiss with an exasperated sigh and together they turned to look at the doorway. Trouble looked back at them, head cocked curiously to one side.

“I forgot all about him,” Petra said.

“I left him outside the town when I sneaked back in. I told him to _stay_.” Aloy gave the scrapper a pointed look, which was completely ignored. He apparently decided they weren’t going to do anything else interesting and trotted into the workshop to explore. Aloy abruptly stepped away from Petra to intercept him. “No! Not scrap. Leave that alone.”

“I should probably get back to work,” Petra said reluctantly. “But will you stay the night? So we can get back to what we were just… discussing? With him on the other side of a shut door,” she added firmly.

“I’d like that very much.” Aloy gave her one more teasing grin. “You only had to ask.”

* * *

 

Late that night, Petra lay awake, running her fingers absently through the hair of the Nora woman half sprawled on top of her. Moonlight filtered into the room. In its dim glow, the flame of Aloy’s hair was muted to a cool gray that reminded Petra of braided cable. It suited her.

“What are you thinking?” came a sleepy voice at her chest.

“That while this is cozy, we need something better than this cot for when you’re here.”

“You’d better get right on that while I’m away, then,” Aloy mumbled.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Petra said with a low chuckle.

“Anything I can get for you while I’m on the road?”

Petra hesitated. She knew part of her would always shy away from sending Aloy into danger. But how could she ask fire not to burn? “I do have an idea that requires some condensers from a stormbird’s lightning cannon,” she admitted.

“Your wish is my command.” Aloy shifted slightly, tightening her hug on Petra. Her breathing deepened as she drifted into sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> The poem Aloy talks about is "The Death of the Hired Man" by Robert Frost. It was probably a bit self indulgent to include the reference. But I couldn't shake the thought that it's the sort of thing that Elisabet would have liked, and that it would speak to Aloy if she learned about it.


End file.
